Chicago Cubs first baseman Anthony Rizzo speaks at a vigil Thursday for the victims of the Florida school shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland. Rizzo is a 2007 graduate of Douglas. “I am only who I am because of this community,” Rizzo said. “I want you to know that you’re not alone in your grief. We’re all grieving with you. So whatever comfort I can give, I will give. (Greg Lovett / The Palm Beach Post)

Parkland victims mourned: ‘You’re not alone in your grief’

Fred Guttenberg stood before a crowd of thousands Thursday night at a candlelight vigil for the victims of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School massacre. There were shouts of “We love you” to him as he stepped to the microphone.

There is anguish in this community, but few knew the sorrow in this man’s heart. A day earlier, Guttenberg lost his 14-year-old daughter, Jaime, as one of the victims of the shooting.

He was too devastated to craft a speech for this. His grief came out raw.

“This makes no sense,” he said. “This is impossible. My girl, my 14-year-old baby … For those of you who knew my baby, she was the energy in the room. She made people laugh and, yes, sometimes she made us cry. But she always made her presence known.

“I sent her to school yesterday. She was supposed to be safe. My job is to protect my children, and I send my kids to school. In the morning, sometimes, things get so crazy. She runs out and goes, ‘I gotta go, Dad. Bye.’ And I don’t always get to say I love you. I don’t remember if I said that to Jaime yesterday morning.

Recommended for you

Most read

“Jaime was such a special kid. All of the kids here are. What is unfathomable is Jaime took a bullet and is dead. I don’t know what I do next. My wife is home. We are broken.”

Guttenberg spoke for three minutes, and tears streamed down faces in the audience throughout. He closed by thanking the people of Parkland for coming together in a powerful expression of support.

There were various political statements about gun laws and elected officials, but all of that was secondary. This wasn’t a show for the international media in attendance or for the rest of the world. This was one of Parkland’s first steps toward healing.

People sent balloons into the sky with messages to their fallen friends. They joined hands for a moment of silence. They prayed in different languages and different faiths.

With Douglas High closed for at least the rest of the week, this was the way for students and people of this city to comfort each other. Religious leaders, government officials, school employees and other public figures came out to the amphitheater at Pine Trails Park, including a delegation from the Miami Dolphins.

“I’m just continuing to show support to the families and community here that has been affected by this and spread love,” said Jarvis Landry, one of about a dozen people from the organization to attend. “I have a 1-year-old, and it’s hard to think about. A lot of these kids were 13 or 14 years old, and you couldn’t imagine it. To lose your kids, something like this, it’s hard to speak about.”

Chicago Cubs first baseman Anthony Rizzo, a 2007 graduate of Douglas, also spoke at the vigil.

It seemed everyone at the park was one degree away from a victim, and they all had stories about where they were when it happened.

Parents showed each other text messages they got from their kids inside the building, and students recounted tense stories of waiting it out. Some mentioned slight interruptions to their usual routine that incidentally kept them safe.

Walking through the crowd, which began forming well before 6 p.m. and stayed well past the end of the vigil, an endless stream of murmuring trailed from one story into the next:

“I thought it was a false alarm.”

“Then the glass shattered in the hallway.”

“I go through there every morning.”

“I shut the door and turned the lights off and told them, ‘Guys, just chill.’ ”

There were 17 angel figures on the stage, representing the 14 children and three adults who were slain. Teenagers came through leaving flowers and lighting candles as they paused for a moment at someone they knew.

One of those students was a sophomore named Julia Civalero, who’s on the Douglas swim team. She left flowers for Nicholas Dworet, a 17-year-old who was the captain of the boys’ team and had dreams of swimming in the 2020 Olympics.

She cried as she left the makeshift memorial, but it gave her a morsel of closure. She’d been home the night before and was distressed to the point that she couldn’t eat. Being here among friends who know exactly how she feels, though, consoled her.

“It helps a lot,” she said. “It’s sad to think about it, but this helps. You have to stick with everyone who loves you. And other people are going through the same thing.”

Mason Hall, a soccer player and the kicker for Douglas’ football team, endured a similar night after the shooting. He held out hope for assistant football coach Aaron Feis, who was shot trying to protect students, and waited nervously for word about a close friend’s 14-year-old brother, Martin Duque Anguiano.

The news was bad for both of them. Hall barely slept.

“I’ve just been laying around trying to process everything that’s going through my brain, trying to cope,” he said. “I was mad. He was 14 years old. I hate that feeling. This kid had a life and a future in front of him, and it got taken away in a second. I’d just seen him in the period before… Coach Feis was really nice, amazing coach. I saw him every single day.”

Feis, 37, seemed to be universally known as a coach, security guard and former student. It’d be difficult to find a student at Douglas who didn’t know who he was.

The world has watched this unfold in Parkland over the last two days, but only here can the people affected by it truly be understood. Nothing needs to be explained. They all know the details, they know the names and they know the pain. The tragedy is a shared experience, and now the healing will be as well.

“Words, at this time, fail us,” a local rabbi said on stage. “But let’s not mistake the silence for despair. Today we need to resolve to make a firm commitment and oath, starting tonight, to the families who have lost loved ones. We are with you. We support you. We will assist you. And we will be with you in every way we can.”